On Friday morning, a woman was shot dead by her husband in the centre of Zagreb. According to legal experts, the case could be treated as a femicide. In the other case, a female body was found in a flat in the Srednjaci neighbourhood of Zagreb.

Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic strongly condemned the murders of the two women as heinous crimes and added that one of these cases could now be treated as femicide under the amended Criminal Code.

He recalled that according to the recently amended Criminal Code, the crime of femicide is punishable by a prison sentence of at least 10 years.

The Mozemo party and the Social Democrats deplored the murder of two women in Zagreb and pointed out that femicides are not isolated cases, but the result of a social framework in which violence has been normalised, with state institutions failing to adequately protect women.

Kekin: Women do not feel safe enough to report violence

“We would like to warn that femicides are not isolated cases, but the result of a social framework in which violence is not recognised in time, in which women do not feel safe enough to report violence and in which perpetrators do not receive deterrent punishments. This is a social framework in which violence has been normalised,” said Ivana Kekin from the Mozemo party.

She added that a different social framework should be created, the Istanbul Convention should be implemented and Croatia should be made a safe country for women.

“Despite repeated warnings from civil society organisations and political actors about the problem of gender-based violence and proposals for specific measures, the government has not shown sufficient commitment in addressing the problem and finally included femicide as a pretext for Lex AP in the amended Criminal Code,” the Social Democrats said in a statement.

Social Democrats: Women are being let down by the state

The fact that there is a law dealing with femicide does not necessarily mean that the Office of the State Attorney-General and the Croatian judiciary will treat a crime as femicide, the party said, noting that this is the most problematic aspect.

Most of the objections to the inclusion of femicide in the Criminal Code came from judges, the party said. They wanted to know whether the murder of a woman by her husband on Friday morning would be treated as femicide, which was apparently the case.

“The fact is that women in Croatia do not report violence because they have been let down by state institutions countless times. We are curious to see what the Ministry of Justice and the relevant institutions will do and whether the inclusion of femicide in the Criminal Code and the protection of women will be just another empty promise of the government,” the party said.